She watched, rooted to the spot as the brickwork plummeted down, about to smash onto the pavement and the street and that man's head and…. But the falling masonry never reached the paralysed rioter. An intense, almost solid burst of sound collided with the blocks and shattered them, leaving the man covered from head to toe in a reddish coating of brick dust.
"Rahne? Are you alright?" Teresa's voice reached her through her frozen state. "Oh god, none of it hit you did it? I wasn't sure I was going to be able to smash all that stuff in time, and…." She kept on talking, but Rahne couldn't make any of it out.
"You… you saved him?" she managed, still feeling slightly out of place, removed from the reality of the events. "I… how did you know?"
"Betsy told me. She's precognitive, some of the time at least." Teresa told her. "You know, she can see what's going to happen?" Rahne looked back at her blankly, not registering the explanation. "Are you sure you're alright?"
"I'm fine," Rahne lied. In truth she was feeling as shattered as the former wall that was now finely dispersed over the ground in front of her and she just wanted to crawl into a den somewhere and hide from the world, but situations like this didn't work that way.
"Oi, Rahne! I need you over here!" Betsy shouted from atop the pile of debris that was once the Shire Arms pub of Northern Liverpool. Rahne nodded mutely and slowly walked over toward the telepath.
"What did you want?" she asked.
"I need some help with recovery. Banshee's dealing with the mutant we picked up, Siryn's helping get rid of the rubble, but I need you to help me locate the survivors." This was not flippant sarcastic Betsy. It was Psylocke, all business and utterly focused. "Brian's underneath all this somewhere – he's okay, I've got mental contact with him, and I can sense a couple more in there that are still conscious, but I don't know how many others there are that aren't, and if they're out cold I can't find them using telepathy." She took a deep breath. "I need you to locate them for me."
Rahne stared at her blankly, trying to marshal her thoughts through the scrambling confusion in her head. "How?"
"Scent, sound, however works best. We need your wolf senses."
Once again the cloying fear gripped her at the thought of using her powers – not just the possibility of losing control, but in front of all these people? These people who'd already shown they would turn into a mob at the sight of a mutant? Visions of being hunted down through the streets ran through her mind, interspersed with memories of her flight across the moors. "I can't," she said in a small voice. "I can't transform."
Betsy gave her a searching look, and Rahne felt the characteristic touch of the older girl delving into her mind. "You've really done a number on yourself, haven't you luv?" she said in a considering tone. "Shit." She sighed. "We don't have the time for this. Your human senses are enhanced these days. Just use them."
She turned back to the rubble, shouting instructions to Teresa. Rahne stared after for a moment, then shook herself. She'd already stood around enough today. Too much. Crouching down over the pile of fallen bricks she closed her eyes, focusing on the information coming through her nose and ears. Betsy's scent was hanging all over the area, but was there something else? She moved further in, toward what had been the centre of the building. There it was again – the faintest suggestion of a different scent, mingled in amongst the arid smell of brick dust and the lingering aroma of scorched wood. A human scent. It was barely perceptible in this form, just the merest suggestion of a distinct odour, but if she focused on clearing all the other perceptions from her mind, she could sense enough to trace it.
Rahne followed the scent to a section of the heap that seemed on the surface no different than the rest. But she was almost sure that her weaker human nose was correct – there was someone buried underneath this part of the remains. And as she knelt down it was confirmed, there was definitely a human scent in the wreckage.
"Betsy!" she shouted. "Teresa! Over here!" The two girls ran over, followed by a dusty but nevertheless recognisable Brian, newly extracted from the rubble. "I've found someone, I think."
It seemed to take next to no time for Brian and Teresa to remove the debris with their powers. Eventually they got rid of enough of the wreckage to reveal the comatose body of a young man, but Rahne felt only the slightest sense of satisfaction. Betsy crossed over briskly and bent down, checking his pulse. "Bruises, maybe some breaks, but he'll be okay." She shot Rahne an encouraging smile. "I reckon you saved this guy's life, luv." Rahne nodded woodenly. Perhaps she'd helped this man, but what about the one earlier, when the roof collapsed? She'd almost cost him his life, all because she was too frightened to use her powers.
……
They were back in the jet and on the way to Muir Island almost before she realised she'd even moved from the scene. Rahne sat with her knees hunched up to her chin, not wanting to have to talk to anyone. No one paid her much attention, which suited her mood perfectly. She wasn't in disgrace, precisely, at least not with the others - that much she knew from her nose. But at the moment they had other things to worry about, like the unconscious mutant they had abducted.
"What did you do? Did you knock him out? When's he going to wake up?" Betsy asked Sean as she and Teresa attempted to sit the young man up.
"One – we paralysed his nervous system, two - nay and t'ree – I think…," Sean glanced down at his watch, "…about now." Sure enough, the man stirred, eyes fluttering as he began to try to stretch muscles stiffened from lack of use. He surveyed his surroundings with a considering eye.
"One minute I'm being attacked by twenty drunken football fans, now I'm being kidnapped and ministered to by beautiful women?" It was said with a laugh, although Rahne could smell a tinge of brassy confusion and nervousness beneath the bravado. "Not that I'm complaining about the company, but what just happened to me?"
"I'll get on t' that in a minute, boyo'," Sean growled brusquely. "But first, we've got a few questions fer y'."
"I'd prefer to have her explain," the man countered, with a suggestive smile for Betsy.
"Cool it, Romeo." Sean warned. He proceeded to fire questions in full police sergeant mode. "Name?"
"Neal Sharra." The reply was crisp and official, the response of an officer to a superior, but his stare was not fixed on his interrogator.
"Powers?"
"I can create super-heated plasma. Most of the time I can control it too." He smiled apologetically, but apparently Sean was in no mood for humour.
"Where're you from, Sharra?"
"Liverpool."
At this point Betsy, who had been following the conversation intently while trying to appear nonchalant, interrupted. "Hang on a tic - that's a lie!"
"Are you reading my mind?" Neal asked. "Don't." She glared at him, but said nothing more. "I've been in Liverpool since I was fifteen," he explained. No irritation showed in his voice or scent, but he had a challenging stare for the purple-haired telepath. "But I was born in Delhi."
Apparently satisfied, Sean explained in some detail about Excalibur, their status as mutants and each of their powers, although he glossed over Rahne's. The 'prisoner' listened carefully to the Irishman's account, finally pronouncing it to be 'interesting'. "And what do you plan to do with me now?"
"Y're coming with us t' Muir Island so we can make sure y've taken no serious harm in all the excitement today. That arm looks like it might need a bit o' attention. After that, yer welcome t' stay or go as y' see fit."
"An extremely tempting offer," Neal replied, eyes still resting on Betsy and tracking over her body speculatively.
"Why the move?" she asked suddenly. Rahne was slightly shocked to see that her friend was actually respecting the man's privacy enough to not simply use her telepathy to discover the answer.
"There was nothing there for me anymore," he answered with a frozen finality that left even Betsy momentarily speechless. He turned away, looking fixedly out the window. There was silence for a few uncomfortable seconds. But with a shrug of his shoulders Neal smiled again and turned back. "But Britain's already looking promising." Rahne was sure she saw him wink at Betsy.
"Be careful what you wish for," the English girl replied, smirking back at him flirtatiously. "You don't know what you might get yourself into.…"
It looked like Neal wanted to follow this line of conversation further, but he changed tack abruptly after Sean cleared his throat with pointed menace. "Actually, I thought it was about time an Indian made his fortune out of the sweat of the English instead of the other way around." This comment brought amused smiles and nods from of the majority of the jet's crew, although Betsy let out a theatrical groan.
"Bloody hell, what is it with you people today? Enough with the English bashing already! You know you're all just sore losers because we conquered you and not the other way around...." But the protest was no more than half-hearted and she trailed off, staring at the young man who once again had his eyes locked on her.
Rahne had to turn away and bury her nose in the leather seat, trying to breathe in any remnants of fumes from the preservatives – the pungent smell of attraction wafting off the two was strong enough to be sickening. They seemed transfixed, and Rahne heard Sean comment under his breath, too quietly for any but her ears to pick up, that this was the first time he'd ever seen someone make Betsy shut up for more than a second. It looked like the telepath was going to be spending a lot more time at Muir Island in the future.
……
Moira was already waiting for them as they came into land, standing out on the landing field silhouetted in the fading light. Rahne noticed absently how small and alone her foster mother looked against the rugged expanse of moor and sea and cliffs.
Teresa was still bubbling over with post-mission enthusiasm. "We've rescued a new mutant!" she called as they descended from the jet. "He's called Neal, and he creates plasma, and…," she stopped short when she saw the blank, empty expression on Moira's face.
"What is it?" Sean asked, his gruff voice tinged with concern.
The scientist looked at him and sighed. "They're charging him with murder, Sean," she replied in a weary tone, shoulders drooping down in an admission of defeat. "Jonothan Starsmore. Butler tried to argue for manslaughter at the least, but they're out for blood. The trial's set to start a week from today."
NB: So, there we go. Like he said – Neal Sharra, plasma blasts. In the comics he was Thunderbird III, but that's a whole long weird story which I'm putting aside for now at least. As always, the back story is changed a bit, but the flirting with Psylocke thing was totally not my invention, I swear! Just another of those random canon facts that make me laugh.
Betsy's precognition is also canon, although she lost it along the years. I always thought that was a pity.